Wednesday, September 12, 2012

Soooooooo. Liz and I will be leaving for Norway on Friday. I have been invited to lecture at the Oslo National Academy of Art's Metal and jewelry program. I am VERY excited. Of course it means a lot of sleepless nights working on my lecture.

After visiting with the guy at the AT&T store I have found out that my phone is going to be almost 1$ a minute. So I am not sure how much blogging I will be doing while I am there. I will however take tons of photos so I can remember the experience. I have a bad habit of not remembering when I am in the thick of it. I hope to have some free time to visit some sites etc. Liz and I have been so busy lately that it has been hard to sit down and write something. We have had a number of crazy things that have put the studio and the blog on hold. On a sad note we had to put down our dog. He had a slew of health issues. The vet told us that anyone of them he could drop dead from. I felt like he was keeping himself alive for us. After realizing that he must be in agonizing pain I had to make the call. It was probably the hardest thing I have ever done in my life and I hope that I will never have to do that again. For 15 years I have been getting up and letting him out or taking him for a walk. I still find myself rushing home to let the dog out or getting up early when I hear what I think is scratching at the door. I am sure this will pass but in the mean time sleep has been VERY hard to find.

The schedule is filling up. After Norway I immediately go to Milwaukee to do a lecture and a workshop. This summer I will be teaching at Haystack and Penland. Somewhere in the middle I have two shows and a couple of pieces being made for themed exhibitions. Of course during all of this I am teaching and doing my tech job at New Paltz. Liz and I are considering renting a large studio space. I think it is about time to finally do this. Forever my studio has been in my house. I worry sometimes about the hazards of having a studio at home and I feel like if i was paying for it I would use it more. I think at this point in my career I actually need it in order to keep up with everything.

That is all for now. I will try to make another blog entry before our trip.